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When trying to make an account merge request at https://meta.stackexchange.com/contact, I always get this error:

oops! this isn't a link to a valid profile

But the URL link I put in the form is completely valid, such as the following which can be opened https://stackexchange.com/users/1252935/water-stone (although if you click it directly, this link seems to be invalid).

The same question has been asked quite a few times, but a working solution does not seem to exist. An old answer is to add "meta" in the URL, such as https://meta.stackexchange.com/users/1252935/water-stone, but this becomes an invalid URL (although if you click it directly, this link seems to be valid). So, even if adding "meta" happened to work for some people in the past, it does not seem to work in 2022.

I'm asking this question here one more time, in case some expert has a working solution to share, or maybe this issue will be fixed in a better way (at least to make the error message less confusing, even if it does not provide any useful instruction).

To show the issue more clearly, I've added two screenshots showing that the URL with "meta" or without makes no difference at all.

Enter image description here

Enter image description here

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    No your link is not valid. It leads to a 404.
    – Luuklag
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 6:57
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    I think you need to provide a "user profile" link. That is the link for a user on a site. What you use as link is the so called "Network" or "Account" link and that is not a valid "user profile". Compare: My Network / Account and My SO User Profile or My KennyBot profile
    – rene
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:01
  • If you directly click the two links in this question you will observe the opposite to what I wrote. But if you replace the id and idname by your own, and try both on a browser directly, you'll see exactly the same as what I wrote (The one with meta in the url will fail, the one without meta works). Anyway, both with meta and without meta, you would get the same error message!!!
    – water stone
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:02
  • Rene, that is the url obtained when I clicked my "profile". Unless you provide an example of a different url for profile, I doubt that would be the issue
    – water stone
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:04
  • I don't have a ton of accounts ready to merge, so I rather not try it to have it succeed in my case ....
    – rene
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:05
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    This link: meta.stackexchange.com/users/4276474 is not a user on this site. It is correctly invalid.
    – rene
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:11
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    This would be valid: meta.stackexchange.com/users/1252935/water-stone
    – rene
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:14
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    And so would askubuntu.com/users/265231/water-stone be
    – rene
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:14
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    Your user ID will not be same in all communities. Your network profile user ID (stackexchange.com/users/4276474/water-stone) won't match with your Meta Stack Exchange user ID (meta.stackexchange.com/users/1252935/water-stone).
    – Random Person
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 7:36

1 Answer 1

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OK, thanks to the keen eyes of Rene and Person, I found the issue. The solution written here hopefully can help others who may experience a similar problem:

The id# right after the /users/ in the URL is the key. You likely have different ids on different Stack Exchange sites, but the only id that works with the meta in the URL should be the id assigned to your meta account, not other accounts.

You can get this id# by clicking "Meta" on the top left bar of your browser after you log in. Then you'll see a "Users" option on the left side of your browser. Click that "Users" and then input your user nickname into the users box. If you already have an account on meta, you would get a correct full URL associated with your account, otherwise simply sign up for a meta account.

The full URL obtained this way should work in the form at https://meta.stackexchange.com/contact/.

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    Sorry, I'm honestly confused after reading your answer. Please read this: meta.stackexchange.com/q/229789 and meta.stackexchange.com/q/223743.
    – Random Person
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 8:20
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    When logged in, the URL for your profile on the site you're currently viewing is available in the topbar as the URL to which your avatar/reputation/badges links to. That's your profile page and is the correct URL for your profile on the site which you are currently viewing. On that site, it's the same URL which is used for every usercard below each post you've made and your username on every comment you've posted. On any site, you can also navigate to your profile page by going to /users/current, which will redirect you to your profile page on that site.
    – Makyen
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 17:18
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    Your profile ID number will be different for every Stack Exchange site, so you could have almost a couple hundred different profile IDs, one for each SE site. In addition, you have an account ID. Your account ID, which is used in URLs to stackexchange.com, like stackexchange.com/users/<ID> can be found on your site profile pages as the "Network profile" link at the top-right (may be in a dropdown menu). On stackexchange.com, you can view a few pages which consolidate your activity from all Stack Exchange sites.
    – Makyen
    Commented Sep 9, 2022 at 17:18

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